House where baby drowned had pot crop

LA MESA  A 1-year-old girl died and her 2-year-old brother was hospitalized Monday after their mother found them in a swimming pool at a house where she had been staying in unincorporated La Mesa, sheriff’s homicide officials said.

A marijuana grow was found in the basement of the house, homicide Lt. Glenn Giannantonio said.

The mother and a man who lives at the home on Sunset Avenue, near Fuerte Drive, drove the injured children to a fire station, the lieutenant said. They did not call 911.

The mother at first told authorities the children were found in the pool at the Lamplighter Village mobile home park in Spring Valley. She said she was at a friend’s home about 10 a.m. when she “essentially lost track of the children” and discovered them in the water, Giannantonio said.

She later told authorities she had lied because she wanted to protect her friend, because he did not have a safety fence around his backyard pool, the lieutenant said. She had been staying at the house with her children for several days.

The mother said she woke up about 9:45 a.m. and could not find the children, then saw them in the pool. She and her friend pulled them out, jumped in his truck and were taking the children to Sharp Grossmont Hospital in La Mesa when they passed the fire station on Grossmont Boulevard and stopped there instead.

Paramedics transported the children to the hospital, where the girl was pronounced dead. The boy was transferred from Grossmont to Rady Children’s Hospital.

The man ran from the fire station and has not been located, Giannantonio said.

Homicide detectives, along with deputies from the Lemon Grove sheriff’s station and county Child Protective Services, are conducting the death investigation. There is currently no evidence of foul play, Giannantonio said.

Investigators from the Narcotics Task Force are handling the marijuana probe. KMFB-TV, Channel 8, showed an aerial view of the pool, with about a dozen containers that appeared to be garden pots floating on the water.